The Hawk and the Raven
by The Real F'n Scorp
Summary: Clint Barton falls deathly ill and finds help where he least expects it. Gift!fic for Midorima Kazunari. One-shot *complete*


**A/N:** This chapter is a very belated gift!fic for the amazing Midorima Kazunari whose birthday it was last month! Happy belated Birthday Mid!

Clint Barton is not a character I am as comfortable/familiar with writing as I am Steve Rogers. If he doesn't seem completely in character, I apologize; I tried my best to capture him as closely as I could.

* * *

><p>Fire.<p>

There was an inferno licking at his insides, scorching his outsides, and slowly stealing away his every breath with its smoldering touch. It felt as if he was being tortured by a lover spreading fiery kisses across the ridges of his back, over the contours of his abdominal region, across his face and throat. For a moment, just one, he imagined himself as the mythological flame bird, the phoenix. For a moment, just one, he anticipated dissolving in a huge ball of fire, only to emerge mere seconds later as a new man, cleansed of all his sins and freed from the chains which bound him to his hellish existence.

If he was dying (and he imagined he was), then this was his body's way of preparing him for the nine levels of Hell he was about to be sent to. Every inch of his body was one solid wall of _hurt_. Even the tips of his hair were somehow pulsating with pain. Clint Barton struggled to find a comfortable position in which to lay, but found none existed. In the quiet of the small room his breathing was loud and raspy; his entire body shuddered with it. God he was hot-so fucking hot. He must have fidgeted or made some type of sound because suddenly a cool cloth was being laid across his forehead. Clint would have sworn on a stack of Bibles that he heard the goddamn thing _sizzle_. He grunted out a curse and went to tear the offending cloth away when a soft voice, like warm caramel whispered "stop," and told him he would "feel better soon."

Who the owner of that voice was, he did not know. He struggled to focus upon the face looking down at him. Eyes like melted chocolate gazed at him from a face that reminded him of bronzed copper. Sculpted cheekbones, aquiline nose and full lips were set in a small, round face framed by a wealth of long hair the same glossy shade of a raven's wing. Strands of that hair trailed over his face and reminded him of times when Tasha's cherry curls would billow back and obstruct his view.

_I could really use you now, Tasha. I'm in a bad way..._

His fears and worries became forgotten, though, the moment his benefactress stroked a moist rag over his overheated flesh. Clint let out a tiny little moan at the momentary relief from the conflagration trying to consume him and was further rewarded when a hand cupped his cheek, thumb sweeping gently over his parched flesh. It reminded him of when he was a kid and how his mom would stroke his face while he was in bed sick with the flu. Then she set a cool rag on his cramping belly and everything he was thinking, feeling at that moment fled his mind faster than roaches when you flipped on the lights. This woman could be Loki in disguise and he wouldn't give a shit. She was giving him relief from his misery and that made her his only friend in the whole wide world at that exact moment. Then the fire returned, raging hotter than even before and making him wish that the end would come switfly.

"Let me die," he whispered, and the harsh, choking sound of his voice shocked him. "Just... let me fucking die."

"Shhh," she murmured. "It is not time for you to die, Cetan. Wakan Tanka has things in store for a great ozuye like you."

"Wha-what are you?" he mumbled around the chattering of his teeth. How he could be so hot and still shiver as if cold made absolutely no sense to him. "Are you a goddamn shaman or something?"

"Heyah - no," she soothed as he fidgeted. "Miyelo ca kola."

"Hell's that mean?"

"I am a friend."

He barked a hoarse laugh as he attempted to push himself up in the makeshift bed. "Lady, I ain't got no friends. Not after what I've done."

"There you are wrong." Her fingers were gentle as they stroked his hair. "You have many kolas, Cetan."

"Bullshit."

She didn't bother to argue with him. No, she simply continued petting him and making low, soothing sounds deep in her throat that slid down to where his nerves were clenched and relaxed them.

"Sleep now," she crooned. "Sleep now and forget about the troubles which weigh so heavy upon your heart and soul."

Clint allowed himself to drift off. He dreamed that night about a raven and a hawk sitting on what looked like the top of a familiar shield sticking up out of a mound of fresh dirt...

* * *

><p>He burned for three days and three nights. The few times he managed to swim towards a state of consciousness, it was to the sound of something being rattled. At first, he thought it was a rattlesnake, coiled and readying itself to strike. He slowly reached for the hunting knife he always stuck beneath his pillow before going to sleep, but stopped when a soft chanting rose above the <em>chaka shaka chaka <em>sound emanating from the rattler. The words didn't make a bit of sense to him, but the warm cadence of her voice washed over him, flooded into him, bringing comfort to his tortured mind and body. The storm raging inside him quieted and Clint drifted peacefully on a wave of nothingness. It felt like pillowy hands cradled his body, soothing the aches and pains ransacking his body and stemmed the flow of lava in his veins. He thought he heard the distinctive screech of a hawk. He shook himself, grunted a laugh at his absurdity.

_Hearing shit, Barton. Next thing you'll swear you're seeing hawks flying around the ceiling. _

Just the mere thought of that had him levering open his feverish eyes long enough to evaluate himself and his surroundings. He was lying on his back on a soft bed. The ceiling was painted (rather amazingly in his limited opinion) to depict the summer sky. A red-tailed hawk was soaring over the desert plains and Clint swore he heard it give another piercing cry.

"Lemme die," he groaned as his belly pitched and rolled. "Just lemme die."

"Heyah, Cetan," he heard her murmur in a voice that seemed to search out all the places inside him that weren't all that pretty, and with every whisper, fix them. "It is not time for you to die."

"Who are you?" he rasped. "What are you?"

"I am a kola," she told him again. "I am a friend."

"Yeah?" That he could even snark as he lay dying amazed him. "Names are for friends and I don't have any."

"Micaje kagi taka."

He let out a soft chuckle. "Gonna have to get you to write that one down."

"Raven," she told him as she stroked one elegant finger over his cheek. "Just remember my name is Raven, Cetan. Now, sleep."

"Rav-" he yawned right before the world again went dark.

* * *

><p>"Why do you call me Cetan?" Clint asked the next time he awoke. "And what exactly does it mean?"<p>

"You are the one Coulson calls Hawkeye, are you not?" she questioned as she wiped his brow with a damp sponge. When he merely grunted in response, she smiled. "In Lakota, Cetan is known as the hawk spirit. So," she said with a shrug of her shoulders. "I call you the Hawk."

"Hawk spirit?" Clint snorted and pushed himself up in the bed with only moderate difficulty. "I'm not a spirit, Raven."

"No," she agreed with a slight shake of her head. "You are not a spirit. I think you are a lost ozuye."

One eyebrow lifted. "You think I'm a lost what's it?"

"A lost warrior," she told him. "And yes." She nodded for emphasis. "I do think that you are one."

Clint didn't bother asking how or why she thought that. Instead he asked, "Why do you think I am this hawk spirit?" as Raven settled a tray across his lap with a fragrant bowl of soup wafting up to tease his nostrils. His belly growled noisily even as his mouth watered. For a man who lived on rations the majority of the time, anything home cooked was a rare and savored treat.

"The Hawk is renowned for his prowess as a hunter. His eyesight is far superior to that of humans and allows him to search out his prey even in the smallest of crevices."

Same as he once was renowned for being a master archer. _No more_, he thought with only a trace of bitterness biting at his heart and festering in his soul. _I lost all that when Loki possessed my mind and commanded that I turned upon my friends and teammates_.

"That may be," he grumbled as he stirred the thick soup with his spoon. "But I don't see why you think that I am a hawk spirit."

"The Lakota consider Cetan to be both the Guardian as well as the Protector of the Earth Mother and all of her children. He is the warrior that protects the people from evil spirits."

"I'm not a warrior."

"Really?" Raven drawled. "Well, according to Iroquois legend, the Hawk, known as the _Thunderer_ is armed with a mighty bow from which he shoots flaming arrows." A pause. And then Clint watched those glossy eyes shift towards the chair beside the bed and saw one dark brow arch derisively. "Correct me if I am wrong, Cetan, but I do believe that that bow and quiver mark _you_ as an archer."

"I might be an archer," Clint stated in a voice so low that Raven had to lean close to him in order to hear him speak, "but I lost the right to calling myself the Hawk when I turned my back upon my friends and teammates."

Only silently did he add, _and put arrows in some of them_.

"You were not Cetan then," she told him quietly. "You were possessed by iktomi, the trickster and made to do his bidding. You cannot be held to blame for things that are wo-wakan in nature."

"Wo-what'sin?"

"Supernatural."

"Ah."

Raven lips curved gently as she spied the disbelieving look upon his face. "You were and still are Cetan, Mr. Barton."

Clint pondered that for a moment. It wasn't that he believed himself to be any type of divine spirit or great warrior. No more than he believed he was worthy still of calling himself an Avenger. After what all he'd done? He didn't deserve to call himself anything other than low-life bastard, or mass murdering bastard. Or better yet... _traitor_. He glanced over at the quiver of arrows and curved bow she'd set in the chair beside the bed. Was he still the Hawk? Or had he lost all rights to the name? To what had been his identity for as long as he could remember? Raven must have sensed his dissidence because she set one of those small hands with those quick, clever fingers upon his shoulder and squeezed it gently.

"Eat," she suggested. "You need to rebuild your strength. Then you can go on a spirit quest and rediscover for yourself whether the Hawk still flies or not."

Clint complied. Aside from anything else, the soup was the most delicious thing he'd eaten in months and he was hungry enough to eat a buffalo.

* * *

><p>He was packing his gear fourteen mornings later when Raven came into the bedroom and handed him something wrapped in rawhide. It was clothing of some type from what he could tell. And leather from the buttery feel and smell.<p>

"What's this?" he asked as he took it from her.

"A present," she said with a small mysterious smile. "It is just something small in which to remember me by."

Clint turned his head to look at her. Raven Saint-James wasn't the most gorgeous woman he'd ever met. _Beautiful_ just wasn't a good enough word to describe this woman in his opinion. It was far too soft and only covered a physical characteristic. This woman went far beyond a general and bodily description. In Clint's mind, there was something to be said about the understated beauty of compassion, generosity and rectitude. Even the flashiest of women paled in comparison to this one. And that, Clint realized as he set her gift in his bag, was because they lacked her warm heart and gentle soul.

"I won't ever forget you, Raven," he told her gruffly. "Or what you have done for me. I'd have died out there if you hadn't found me and brought me into your home."

"Helping a man sick with fever requires no thanks."

_Yes, this is a very good woman_, Clint thought as he zipped his bag. One of the few in Fury's employ who remembered what honor and loyalty actually meant. _Even knowing what I did she still believes in me, still considers me an ally, as the Hawk_. Clint didn't know if that was because she was just that naïve or simply hadn't acquired the same jaded worldview as other S.H.I.E.L.D operatives (such as him and Tasha) had. She reminded him of Rogers—someone still capable of seeing the world full of hope and decent people. _I hope you never lose that ability,_ he told her silently. He slung his quiver of arrows on his back and grabbed his bow and bag in one hand before turning to walk from the bedroom.

He saw little things as he passed through the house that told him things about the woman who'd taken care of him for the last couple of weeks. There were the bookshelves loaded with books and Disney knickknacks along one wall in the front room and the family photographs that lined the front entry hall. Spears, shields, arrowheads and other artifacts were on display in curio cabinets all around the room. It all reminded Clint of the woman herself: _eclectic_. He smiled as he opened the front door and stepped out onto the porch.

"Are you sure that you are ready to leave?" she asked as she stepped out beside him. "You are welcome to stay for as long as you'd like."

Clint glanced at her. "I have red in my ledger that could spill out onto you, Raven."

"I am not afraid of the red in your ledger, Cetan."

"You should be."

"Is she afraid of the red in your ledger?"

Clint followed her gaze and saw Tasha sitting in the driver's seat of an SUV he assumed had been proliferated from some poor, unsuspecting individual. His lips quirked and his heartbeat quickened at seeing the lovely operative had come for him.

"Tasha isn't afraid of much," he finally told her.

"Neither am I, Cetan."

No, he could see that. "Take care of yourself, Raven," he said as he stepped off the porch.

"Toksha ake wacinyuanktin ktelo, Cetan," she replied quietly. "And remember that you have a kola here should you ever find yourself feeling lost and alone."

"I will keep that in mind," Clint said as he walked around the SUV. He was reaching for the rear door handle when he heard the flapping of wings. He glanced up and found himself eye to eye with a large brown bird with a cream underbelly and eyes that seemed to peer all the way into his soul.

"_Chwirk_," the bird said as he cocked his head to the side. "_Chwirk_."

"Yeah," Clint said as he opened the door and set his stuff inside. "I get it. I'm Cetan."

"_Kee-ee-aee_," it shrieked before it spread its huge wings and took flight. "_Kee-ee-aee!_"

Clint watched the hawk circle overhead, feeling his blood pump with a hunger to go out and hunt some sort of prey. _I'll live up to my totem_, he vowed silently as he hopped into the passenger seat.

_I'll go out and protect the innocent. _

_Just like Cetan. _

* * *

><p><strong><span>Glossary of Lakota words: <span>**

_Cetan_: Hawk spirit

_Wakan Tanka_: Great Spirit

_Ozuye_: warrior

_Heyah_: no

_Miyelo ca kola_: I am friend

_Kolas_: friends

_Micaje kagi taka_: My name is Raven

_Iktomi_: trickster

_Wo-wakan_: supernatural

_Toksha ake wacinyuanktin ktelo_: I will see you soon


End file.
